Whats happened since independence?
In the late 1980’s the Soviet bloc began to crumble, and in 1991 Armenia declared independence. The new democratic republic was quickly recognized by the United Nations, the United States, and the European Union. The Republic of Armenia immediately faced several daunting challenges: creating a government, earthquake recovery, economic and legal reform, national security, energy development and environmental cleanup, to name a few. But the most immediate problem was the developing crisis in neighboring Azerbaijan, where an overwhelming majority in the historically Armenian region of Nagorno Karabakh (Artsakh in Armenian – map) voted for independence after seventy years of Soviet-imposed Azeri rule.
